Mark L. Hopkins: When Christmas music comes alive

Monday

Dec 18, 2017 at 10:26 AMDec 18, 2017 at 10:26 AM

Mark L. Hopkins More Content Now

Several years back I spend most of December in India visiting several cities. It was Dec. 22 when I was on a plane moving down the taxiway headed for home. Just at the edge of my consciousness I became aware that the wonderful Christmas carol “Hark, the Herald Angels Sing” was playing on the intercom. It had been a year since I had heard Christmas music and I had not been thinking about Christmas at all since the normal decorations of the season are not generally found in most parts of India. Suddenly, the feeling of heading for home, of family and Christmas, was very much on my mind and I closed my eyes to listen to a song about Angels and a newborn King. There was an emotion that swept over me that is difficult to describe.

C.S. Lewis said, “If we find ourselves with a desire that nothing in this world can satisfy, the most probable explanation is that we were made for another world.” Yet, we need a Savior to show us the way to that other world, the same one promised by the prophets of old. They said, “O Come, O Come, Emmanuel,” “Come thou long expected Jesus.”

Those prayers were answered at the first Christmas when “It Came upon the Midnight Clear,” in “O Little Town of Bethlehem,” where in the stillness of that “Silent Night, Holy Night,” they found that Messiah, “Away in a Manger.” Those “Angels from the Realms of Glory” sang the first Christmas carols that night and proclaimed astonishing news, “Hark, the Herald Angels Sing,” “Glory to the New Born King.” Their song was an invitation to worship and they told us, “O Come, All Ye Faithful,” and in their song the angels answered the most important question ever asked, “What Child is this?”

He is both “Infant Holy, Infant Lowly,” the son of God, but who came to earth to take on human flesh. So, “Joy to the World! The Lord is Come,” “Good Christian Men, Rejoice” because he came to save us from ourselves. Those who believe in the Christ of Christmas will find an answer for their longing hearts. “God Rest You Merry, Gentlemen.” This news is too good to keep to one’s self, so proclaim it to all the earth. “Go, tell it on the Mountain.”

Each Christmas season, we celebrate the birth of our Savior in song. We joy in singing the old carols in worship and join with the Angelic choir. Let us bend our knee with shepherds and wise men. Because, “On Christmas Night All Christians Sing,” “Glory to the New Born King.”

— Dr. Mark L. Hopkins writes for More Content Now and the Anderson Independent-Mail in South Carolina. He is past president of colleges and universities in four states. Books by Hopkins currently available on Amazon.com and Barnes & Noble include “Journey to Gettysburg” and “The Wounds of War,” both Civil War-era novels, and “The World As It Was When Jesus Came.” Contact him at presnet@presnet.net.